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Hello,
What highway fuel economy would you estimate a 2010 Toyota Prius would achieve driving on a several hundred mile highway trip, with speeds held between 80 & 90 mph?

Thanks in advance

Hi 98 1LE:

___Welcome to CleanMPG.

___80 to 90 mph is not only illegal on every road in America but downright dangerous in any incident you would come up on. Your perception, reaction and physical stopping distances from that speed would be measured in multiple football fields and nobody is able to anticipate that far ahead no matter who you are.

___An item I like to bring up with journalists regarding “their time” is if they hate the time behind the wheel of the car so much, why are they driving and why are they writing about it? Slow down to the limits, enjoy the ride and save the fuel for the rest of the country. That is unless you enjoy sending some of your hard earned cash to our friends overseas that really do not like us very well? The Prius is one of the best oil savers on the road today. Please use it for its intended use, not to burn up the highway at 35 mpg or worse.

___Good Luck

___Wayne

I can tell you if you drive at 55 mph you can get close to 65 mpg and at 60 mph you can get between 60-62 mpg with the cruise control on. I can't help you on higher speeds because I have never driven my 2010 over 60 mph.

I would guess at 65 mph you would be looking at 52-55 mpg.
At 70 mph you would be in the mid forties

Why would you want to drive a Prius at 80-90 mph anyway?

To answer your question, I'd guess a Prius driven at those speeds would somewhere in the 30s, at best. Remember, wind resistance goes up with the cube of speed: a vehicle driven at 90mph has to overcome more than 3.3 times the wind resistance as at 60mph. Even in an aerodynamic vehicle like the Prius, you're going to pay for it.

And for what? A couple hours of time, at most? Here's a personal experience: a few years ago my wife and I drove a rental car from Minnesota to Portland, and we treated Montana in particular like an autobahn, mostly going 85-95mph all the way across. And you know what? We arrived back home strung out, frazzled and exhausted from all that high-speed, high-intensity driving, not to mention the constant lookout for cops. We didn't even want to get in a car for months afterward. It was more than a year before we took a significant roadtrip again, we were so sick of freeway driving.

Then for contrast, 2 years ago I bought my Jetta in Arizona and drive it 1500 miles home, nearly as great a distance as the MN trip. But I drove it 60mph, arriving home perhaps a few hours later than if I'd driven it fast. And guess what?

I arrived home relaxed, refreshed and ready to do it again.
I got to actually take in and enjoy the spectacular scenery along the way.
I used a lot less legal stimulant (caffeine).
I didn't even think of watching out for cops.
And I saved an entire tank of gas.


Ever since that experience I have concluded that except in an emergency, it is entirely irrational to drive at high speeds for any significant distance. If you really need to get somewhere that fast, hop on a plane.

If you're wanting to minimize your mpg drop at the higher interstate speeds, the stock Prius shape is inadequate. You're going to have to aeromod your car similar to mine. But even though the mileage drop won't be much, you're still going to arrive a bit shell shocked from doing an all day at 80-90mph drive, expecially if you're driving the conga line with the other speeders in the fast lane. Its much more relaxing to cruise at 60-70mph mostly in the slow lane.

Hello,
What highway fuel economy would you estimate a 2010 Toyota Prius would achieve driving on a several hundred mile highway trip, with speeds held between 80 & 90 mph?

Thanks in advance

FE would be in the 20s or 30s. This is estimating from my Civic mileage at the track with max speeds of ~95mph. The Hybrid would be useless after a few miles.

More importantly a Prius, like most stock autos, will lose its ability to turn or swerve sharply ~80-85mph and will become a ballistic object at ~90-95mph.

After the cost of the speeding ticket your FE would be about 10mpg.

Money is tight right now and speed enforcement is an easy way to generate revenue. At 10-15 over the highest posted speed limit I know of you would be easy to spot.
Something to consider.

Thanks WriConsult for your input. I have a long trip to Albuquerque from Tucson AZ (8hrs normally) in August and will take your advice.

Scot

We must have more than one thing in common c.cerevisiea.

Same ride and I'm guessing you are either a homebrewer or a professional brewer.

I work at Avery in Boulder. :Banane35:

98 1 le- my guess is about 28-30 mpg at 85mph.
There was just such a chart-showing mpg vs speed for a Prius and other cars-available on the internet.My memory says it was done by some European journalists.

At 65 mph you'll get about 50 mpg-(set cc to 68 average driving speed about 64 mph).

More importantly you won't save as much time as you think.
If you set the CC to 85 mph, your actual average driving speed will be more like 75 mph because of all the slowing down you'll have to do while trying to pass slower traffic, and all the road work with 45-55 mph limits.Your total drive time will also be increased since you'll have to stop every 250 miles for fuel vs every 400 miles at 68.
If you set your CC to 68 mph your actual driving speed average will be more like 64 mph-and mpg about 50..

An 1100 mile trip will be just under 16 hours with your CC set to 85 mph -4 15-20 minute gas stops.

An 1100 mile trip cc set to 68 mph=17.75 hours with two 15 minute gas stops.

Figure the gas stops are a wash-bathroom breaks etc- so you save about 2-2.5 hours by driving at 85mph. You really will be tired driving at that speed-constantly on high alert because you'll constantly be closing on folks-and watching for cops.You'll use about 14 more gallons-$50 to save two hours, and it is tiring driving that fast.

Set the CC to 65-70 mph- best mpg, lowest stress reasonable drive times.
Saving 2 hours just isn't worth the increased risk and fatigue. We have taken many 3000 mile trips- 78-80 mph(legal in TX I-10) is very tiring even on deserted interstates. 63-67mph-CC set- is pretty comfortable-less road noise,less stress good FE
Luck
Charlie

I make several trips to Fl. that are 1170 miles each way. The difference between running the speed limit which in most states I pass through is 70 mph and the 65 mph maximum speed limit that I drive is an additional 45 minutes.

My range in my 960 (21 gallon tank) running the speed limit up to 70 mph is 500-515 miles. Limiting my top speed to 65 mph the tank range jumps up to 575-600 miles.

At 65 mph I average around 61.5 to 62 mph with stops for the trip, or 18:45 to 19 hours.

We must have more than one thing in common c.cerevisiea.

Same ride and I'm guessing you are either a homebrewer or a professional brewer.

I work at Avery in Boulder. :Banane35:

I love my Tacoma. It's very utilitarian and with the stick shift I can hypermile easily. I keep the Mt Bike racks on because Tucson is Mt bike trail heaven.

I'm a home-brewer. You are very lucky to be able to work at a brewery crafting truly unique beers, not BMC crap. Count your blessings, brother.

I've seen Avery Beers at Bevmo and have yet to try any. Now it's imperative. I'm looking at the India Pale Ale. I like the 4 Cs and the reasonable OG and IBU. The Kaiser looks good too as I've always liked a good malty bier.

I recently tried some Citra and Simcoe hops, very delicious. The Citra has that crazy peach, mango, pear, passionfruit flavor that is just unreasonable to expect from hops!

I'm enjoying an Imperial Pint my of (Firestone Walker) pale ale base (but) dry hopped with Citra and Amarillo, in your honor.

Let me know of your hypermileing experience with the Tacoma. I'm always trying to improve my techniques, in bier and hypermileing.

Scot s.cerevisiae@yahoo.com if you wish to write directly. :Banane35::Banane35::Banane35::Banane35:

Though I did a bit of home brewing years ago, I'm more of a beer consumer now. Just one most nights with dinner, and it better be good!! We are truly blessed in the US at the moment to have so many amazing craft beers available.

Spent some time in Guatemala recently and I missed the beers available in the US. Gallo (pronounced "guy-o") is the Bud equivalent down there. The only other choices were some Russian beer (which I was told was truly awful), Corona, Heineken, Becks (best taste of the bunch to me), and Negra Modelo (interesting but at $2/bottle only for special occasions!).

I'm a big fan of Dogfish Head and Flying Dog. My buddy and I pass beer recommendations back and forth. His latest "find" was Flying Dog Raging Bitch, a Belgian style IPA. Weird concept but I like it.

Maybe we need to add a beer forum???

Yeah, I think we are off topic here.

However, there is a Forum in Off Topic called Anything Goes.

We can post there.

I'll start a thread so look there.

Must try that Flying Dog Raging Bitch, Belgian style IPA. Sounds interesting. I like both styles. It's a funky yeast flavor, hoppy, bitter kind of thing, (like some of my first batches of beer ;-)

Scot